Nerf Anivia? (TL;DR at the bottom)
Hey everyone,
Now before all you frostbird-lovers get your downvote cannons and aim it at my head, please hear me out first. Many of you, possibly even Anivia players themselves, might agree that her E gets increasingly infuriating the moment Anivia gets her Ult.
Pre 6, Anivia players are likely to farm, play passively and eventually throw a Q out here and there. If she hits you, she might send the E flying your way aswell. With the Chilled debuff from her stun, the E will do double damage. And that's pretty much alright in my opinion. The counterplay here is to simply not get hit by her Q. Tricky, maybe, but manageable. Now when Anivia has access to her Ult, that's when problems arise. As you know, her ult instantly applies the Chilled debuff, even if you've been standing in it for not even a second. With that debuff, she can send her E (a targeted ability nonetheless) at your face, making it crit and freezing your nose off. That's not okay. There's no counterplay to it. Some people might say one can easily walk out of her Ult. Well, it does slow you and, as I mentioned earlier, the target is chilled at once so even if you walk out of it, her E will still deal double damage. And you can't flash those.
Gragas needs to have his Q laying somewhere for two seconds before it crits. Karthus' Q will only crit if he hits a single target. Both are much easier to dodge than Anivia's E and more difficult to land, if you will.
Now, I wouldn't be ranting about this if I didn't have a few alternatives to compensate for some changes.
Option 1: Anivia's Ult does not apply the Chilled debuff instantly. The target must have been standing in it for a fixed duration, which would not be 0.1s, for it to be chilled and allow the E to crit. This would give the enemy the ability to quickly remove themselves from the zone before Anivia's E can deal 'too much' damage. Option 2: Anivia's Ult applies the debuff immediately. However, when applied by her Ult, the debuff will reduce the E's crit damage by (I'm bad at numbers, so bare with me) 25%? However, when the Chilled debuff has been applied by her Q, which is a skillshot and much harder to hit, the crit damage from her E onto said Chilled target is increased, respectively by 25% as to compensate for the Ult+E's damage reduction. Option 3: Anivia's Ult is given a sort of visual indicator which would tell the enemy where it is going to appear before it actually does. Given it has no cast time worth mentioning and Anivia can simply place it under the enemy, throwing her E right after, before deactivating it again (For almost no mana cost, especially when one has a Tear or Rod of Ages) to still deal a blizzard of pain, of course, once the Ult appears, it would apply the Chilled debuff as soon as a target is standing in it. Right now, though, Anivia players have to 'barely graze the enemy with the very edge of their Ult' before using an instant E and it will deal damage. A lot of it. Not much counterplay possible on that one.
These are the three suggestions I came up with when thinking of how to not simply reduce Anivia's power, but open up some paths for the enemy to dodge some of the hurt without nerfing her to the ground.
As such, I am calling out to any Anivia players and/or the Gameplay & Balance team at Riot. Are these changes worth considering? Would they overshoot or nerf Anivia's damaging power? Do they indeed create meaningful ways for enemies to play against Anivia? Do they add clarity/counterplay?
TL;DR: Anivia E too stronk, no counterplay, plz change
I hope I can get constructive feedback from all of you! Silven
Also, since long post is long, here's a poro. Credit goes to GunSwordNinja
